From the Golden Mount to Mamma Mia!

We managed to get a lot done during the weekend of 29/30 August. On Saturday, we finally paid a visit to one of Bangkok's famous monuments: the Golden Mount, an artificial hill of about 60m. high with a temple on top (itself part of a bigger temple complex). The hill is a bit outside the center but offers nice views over Bangkok. Until not so long ago, it was the highest point in the city. It is now dwarfed by a big and ever-increasing number of skyscrapers (more about this in a future post).

We also welcomed a visitor back: Tomas, who was on his way back from Jakarta to Europe, dropped by for a few hours. He had already stopped by with his girlfriend Bara a few weeks back when they spent a few days in Thailand. We took him to yet another rooftop bar & restaurant: Zense, part of the Central World complex (see previous post).

On Sunday, we went to see the musical "Mamma Mia!", created by the ABBA composers. It was a good show and the mostly Thai audience seemed to also enjoy it a lot.

The rainy season has now also started in earnest, while writing this on a Sunday evening, the sky is pitch black and lightning is illuminating the sky seconds before the thunder cracks through the air with a spectacular bang.

A week at the office

To keep things interesting, we usually only post articles about activities during our free time, weekends, holidays or vacation on this blog. Believe it or not, but we do actually spend most of our time at the office during the week. We will not bore you with our work details but here is some information about Tom's workplace (for information on Nirmala's office, see the older posts). Tom's new employer Agoda, an online travel agent, has its Thai offices at the "Offices at Central World". As the name suggests, this is an office building (top picture), situated in the huge "Central World" complex. Central World contains several shopping malls (Central World, Zen and Isetan), a convention center, a hotel (Centara Grand, in the modern tower in the second picture) and all the facilities that come with it. It is conveniently and centrally situated close to an important intersection and linked by sky walk to the sky train (BTS). The view from the office (27th floor) is quite nice: overlooking the exclusive Royal Bangkok Sports Club which has, among other things, a racing track and golf course in the middle of the city (middle pictures). It is also convenient for shopping and eating: there are literally hundreds of shops and an impressive amount of eateries to choose from. The shopaholics could spend entire days inside this spectacular building (bottom pictures).

A weekend at the beach

Last weekend, we escaped Bangkok's concrete hell to spend some time at the beach. We opted for Pattaya, the nearest sea side resort town to Bangkok. We stayed in a hotel at Jomtien beach, some 20km from dowtown. A big advantage of Pattaya is that it is very well connected to Bangkok so quite easy to get to. Weather was grey but no rain and warm. Near the hotel, we discovered a big amusement park where there were, the Nong Nooch Tropical Garden, offering a series of attractions for families, including a series of different gardens (French style, Butterfly Hill, etc.) as well as a series of child-friendly sculptures. Here are some atmosphere pictures from our weekend at the beach.